Thursday, April 27, 2006

Schneier on Security: New Directions in Malware

It seems funny that the malware writers used such crappy encryption, what SCARES me is that I could have (hopefully didn't) contributed. Hows that? By making cross platform entryption code available for download to programmers. Naturally it never crossed my mind that another coder might be using this for ill, but thankfully the stuff I now have posted has NOT been updated recently enough to make a difference. This is important because I was just about ready to release new versions that would have included some of the most cutting edge encryption stuff. Glad I didn't.

Note the downside to this--real, honest programmers will not have an open avenue to access work done by another. Sorry mates, only the ones I trust will get that kind of code from now on.

CERIAS Weblogs » Security Myths and Passwords

Well, I do have a couple of systems (at work) that require Quarterly password changes. This is anoying, butnot obnoxious. What is obnxious are the systems I MUST log into every so often or the password immediately expires.

I think we KNOW most folk are lax with password based security (and always will be) which means that some sort of biometric would be the better choice.

muenchen.de - Munich Tourist Office

So once again this year I am stapping on my travelling shoes. Work is sending me to Munich (see above link) for a week. Naturally the family has decided to come along and 'support' me :) How sweet of them.

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

"I sue dead people..."

Intel's integrated DX10 part will be slow as a dog

Intel's integrated DX10 part will be slow as a dog: "One developer of a DX10 game planned to come out in fall of 2007 told us: 'We can all do a fallback to SM3.0 or 2.0 for slower graphics parts. However, the product has to have horsepower - judging by our previous experiences with Intel's integrated hell, we'll just spend more man-hours to make our game run faster than a slideshow.'"

I think this is an example of too much market spread for Intel. They were doing better as a leaner, meaner processor generating machine (rather like what AMD is doing now). Product bloat is hurting them.

Monday, April 24, 2006

DailyTech - HyperTransport 3.0 Ratified Today

Not only an open spec, but this thing is some serious shit! Just read through the feature list, there are some real eye-poppers in there, CPU hot-swapping being just ONE of them. Granted todays MB doesn't lend itself well to that, but it is a simple engineering challenge.

Weird News at Tampa Bay's 10

Toshiba maps quantum future | The Register

Toshiba maps quantum future | The Register: "Speaking at an event put together by the Cambridge-MIT partnership, Toshiba scientist Andrew Hammond described how current quantum key distribution systems like MagiQ will be superseded."

Death of the apps installer? | The Register

Death of the apps installer? | The Register: "The specifics concern the launch of Version 4.0 of Softricity's applications virtualisation environment, SoftGrid. The company has concentrated on three areas of the technology to make additions that could create an environment in which there is no real reason to install applications on individual workstations - certainly for business users."

See? More virtualization. I can see the day coming where everything is runnning in a VM. Clean environment, cleanup a breeze...

research links digital images and cameras

Child pornography aside (not trivializing this issue, just pointing out other uses) this would be a good tool. Heck, it simply woul eliminate the issue of digital watermarking that many people use today to 'fingerprint' digital works. It wouldn't eliminate this for works that were completely digitally created (say via Photoshop or some other graphic editor) but images that are used directly from a digital camera would work.

This begs the question, will it work with remastered or touched up photos? The article is not deep enough to answer this, but I think the answer would be "not for certain".

Binghamton University research links digital images and cameras

Child pornography aside (not trivializing this issue, just pointing out other uses) this would be a good tool. Heck, it simply woul eliminate the issue of digital watermarking that many people use today to 'fingerprint' digital works. It wouldn't eliminate this for works that were completely digitally created (say via Photoshop or some other graphic editor) but images that are used directly from a digital camera would work.

This begs the question, will it work with remastered or touched up photos? The article is not deep enough to answer this, but I think the answer would be "not for certain".

Thursday, April 20, 2006

WSJ.com - Portals

WSJ.com - Portals: "he second is that many of these business users are mixing Linux and Windows inside a single computer using an increasingly important technology known as 'virtualization.'

Virtualization involves using software to make one computer act like many. The technology is barely understood outside IT shops, but it is changing the way big businesses use computers. "

Damn straight. It is a total re-think on how to manage and administer systems and environments. I have been heavily involved in rolling out virtualization and it is nothing short of a revolution in how you *think* about computer resources.

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

There are specifica applications where multi-core is not advantageous, but--as pointed out in the article--by the time this ships those may be largely moot. One common case is where the application is not designed to leverage the degree of parallelism offered by multiple CPUs and the OS overhead in managing state partially detracts from the performance of multi-CPU systems (this is why two is not always double the one).

The LightSnake. - The Red Ferret Journal

MultiSwitch hub will allow LAN-less USB sharing - Engadget

MultiSwitch hub will allow LAN-less USB sharing - Engadget: "...will allow two computers to access up to four shared devices without the need to set up a local area network. Called the MultiSwitch hub, this device creates a proprietary behind-the-scenes network, allowing USB-equipped printers, cameras, hard drives, and other peripherals to be accessed by any combination of desktop, laptop, HTPC, or game console -- with both machines able to interact with the devices simultaneously..."

Not a bad device to have around. Sometimes you just want to share a peripheral or three and having to set up a network, configure a client, share the bloody thing...well, it is a lot of work for just that.

Monday, April 17, 2006

Ain't It Cool News: The best in movie, TV, DVD, and comic book news.

So the new season of Who is on, this link has some reviews from other folk :) Me, I consider the first episode 'good'. Not as great as some of the really spectacular episodes from last season, but damn good just the same.

Attack at the Speed of Light - Popular Science

Attack at the Speed of Light - Popular Science: "A solid-state laser like his could now make it to a war zone in part because the bar for energy weapons has been lowered. Blasting an ICBM from 100 miles away requires megawatts of light. Solid-state lasers might never get that powerful. But heating up a mortar from a mile away until the explosives inside detonate—that takes only 100 kilowatts."

I've been suckered by music compression

I've been suckered by music compression: "Then I put in a CD which had been created from a 128kps MP3. The difference was noticeable even before I sat down. The sound was flat, muddy and the channel separation was minimal. This was odd as I had selected 128kps as a compression standard that would be pretty good quality versus compression trade off."

Bad assumption. For speech, 64k is fine (an in mono even). For music, nothing less than 196k/side at the highest sampling rate. Even then, it may not be true to the original. Again, good enough for what? Listening in my car? Sure, ambient noise is plenty high. Home? Not a chance, back the originals for me as well.

Now I do mix down my own MP3 files, I run them through a mixer and a processor with a good bit of tweaking to suit my personal tastes. Still I understand and live with the fact that compression is throwing stuff away. If you are compressing just for mobile audio, pick what works. Compressing just for the sake of storage is silly.

Um... no? Blogging is by and large the open sourcing (if you can use that as a model) of opinion, nay, even rhetoric.

OK, some few bloggers are projecting ideas, but damn few. Even those that are blogging ideas too often wrap it up in opinions such that it becomes difficult to extract the pure idea from the feelings and bais of the blogger. Is that a bad thing? No, not if you accept blogging as another form of expression or speech. Speech is used to spread ideas, but not as opten as opinion.

With as much interesting and mind-numbing stuff as we are seeing in the current state of Quantum computing think on this... State of the art now is comparable to the old bit-by-bit load a register and program the comupter, everything is built out of tube and wire days for the digital world. What happens when we get it to the integtrated circuit equivalent?

God only knows, but I darn sure want to be around to find out. Maybe our new electronic overlords won't take our toys away and make us play in the sandbox.

Monkey Bites

FORTUNE: Plugged In: Who's to blame for high gas prices? - Apr. 13, 2006: "The idea that prices are set by Big Oil, not the traders at the NYMEX and other global bourses, is a misconception that seems to come into vogue whenever energy prices start making new highs. And putting the blame on OPEC, let alone trying to subject a foreign cartel to U.S. laws, seems to be doing anything but dealing honestly with the problem of too much demand and too little supply here at home."

...but it is so much fun to do! Blaming the big guy has become a national pastime.

I guess the saddest part is that we (the public) have known since the 70's that we needed (and could) build much more fuel efficient cars. Yet, here we are 30 years later and not much further advanced than we were then. It has become even more technologically feasible to do and yet we do it as little as possible.

Wired News: The Glory of the Shooter

Wired News: The Glory of the Shooter: "That's what made Halo the top-selling game for the Xbox, after all. Everyone blathered on and on about the immersive story, the fleshed-out characters, the great script, yadda yadda. But that wasn't why they played it. No, they played it because of what the designers called the game's ability to deliver '30 seconds of fun,' over and over again. And those 30 seconds didn't consist of moderating a frickin' guild meeting, if you know what I mean. Nosiree: They consisted of wasting every last freaky alien that wandered anywhere near your muzzle."

Slashdot | Bunk Camp - Apple Gets It Wrong?

The real money is on hardware virutalization (google 'pacifica virtualization' for one example) and then everything above becomes moot. If the hardware is completely virtual, then potentially any OS (or combination of them) can run. With significant multi-core on the horizon (4 or more cores will be common) then each virtualized OS can have one or more CPU cores dedicated. With AMD being the current front-runner in multi-core, don't sell short their intent on enabling virtualization in hardware.

BuzzMachine » Blog Archive » Exploding TV: KA-BLOOM!

See, more convergence. Is this a perfect solution? No, but it is a heck of a start. Broadband has done for video what the internet/dial-up did for music. With the one difference--the TV people are leveraging convergence.

The End of TV as We Know It :: AO

Generally when people say "this is the end of xxx as we know it", it isn't.

In this case, they may be partly right, it is the beginning of the end. The beginning of change. Real fundamental change in established industries is about convergence. A melding of technology/process that ends up evolving what the ultimate goods and/or services were. You would think that the larger companies are the ones to instigate such convergence--and some times they are--often it is the new kid on the block, the new guy.

Industrires that resist such evolution are doomed. Remember the old saying "the customer is always right"? They are and it isn't simply about good service, it is about survival. Unless your audience is captive, they can (and will) move their money elsewhere. Even a captive audience will eventually learn to live WITHOUT your service and move to new services or ways of living. Enough negative pressure will eventually change consumer behavior.

Monday, April 10, 2006

Fanboy Intervention

Fanboy Intervention: "People forget that one reason third-party developers abandoned Nintendo during the N64 era was Nintendo's habit of treating them like something they scraped off a hobo. Those third-party guys were making games, games you might have liked. Nintendo didn't care, because when a third-party makes a game Nintendo actually has to share the money with them"

OK, so I like console news :)

The in-fighting and strange seppuku that the reigning kings of this niche seem to be commiting...is funny.

This May Help Your Firefox Memory Leak

This May Help Your Firefox Memory Leak: " 1. Open Firefox and go to the Address Bar. Type in about:config and then press Enter. 2. Right Click in the page and select New -> Boolean. 3. In the box that pops up enter config.trim_on_minimize. Press Enter. 4. Now select True and then press Enter. 5. Restart Firefox."

Very nice. I saw it drop from 60 mb to <5 mb when it minimizes. It did not immediately jump back to 60 mb either when restored.

Troubleshooting Windows XP, Tweaks and Fixes for Windows XP

Sun sends SPARC team members packing | The Register

Sun sends SPARC team members packing | The Register: "Not too long ago, Sun executives bragged that they would hire any gifted chip engineers on the market. Such braggadocio seems to have faded with Opteron taking on more importance for Sun's future plans. Sun currently shares SPARC costs with Fujitsu."

Hardware is a slippery slope with razor thin margins. You leverage every thing you can to compete. The Opterons are more than capable of filling in the lower-end Sparc processor market. I'd expect to see even more of a shift this was as the Opterons continue to mature. Imagine a 16-core system...

e_sohw 1673su

Wireless Scart AV Sender

Nice, a good and cheap HD solution. We used a low-tech approach ourselves. We had HD satellite receivers in only two rooms and I wanted to move the signal to some (non-hd) sets in other rooms. Rather than take a high-tech (and HD) solution I simply took an RF converter from the SD output and piped it over the old cable wiring left in the house. So now one of the satellite receivers is acting as a broadcaster for that wiring. Simple and cheap, but not HD.

Loot, Not Earnings | Bayosphere

Loot, Not Earnings: "The situation -- and corporate America's indifference to the poison it spews into capitalism -- grows worse every year. Executives don't live in a genuine free market, and will do everything in their power to prevent such a calamity from imposing on their cozy, back-scratching system.

Capitalism? These people are terrified of it."

So maybe making executives is what America is good at?

See the previous posts here about the job market. We are simply seeing an equalization as the planet normalizes labor. After all, the distribution is normalizing so to some extent will the pay scales. There are other games here:

"...low-cost labor in places like China and India have put downward pressure on the wages and benefits of the average American worker. Executive pay, meanwhile, continues to rise at an astonishing rate. The average pay for a chief executive increased 27 percent last year, to $11.3 million..."

So now we are comparing percentages of percentages? Bad math move...

In this case I think the sample size are important you can't directly compare a percentage of the whole (which includes joe six-pack) to a percentage of folks who are by definition already successful (wildly so in many cases).

"According to a government study, the voluntary attrition in the U.S. has outpaced the number of outsourced jobs to emerging nations. Further, for every job outsourced from the U.S., nine new jobs are actually created in the U.S."

So is this a case of overreaction? Probably not if you are in a sector that is impacted.

I have spent a number of years (on more than one occasion) working as a consultant. To me, the field is still quite rich with opportunity for the bright, well educated and/or experienced. The limiting factor on jobs is usually a constraint the candidate imposes, a limitation that they enforce (travel for one).

Apple lets you run Windows XP on Macinteltosh

Apple lets you run Windows XP on Macinteltosh: " is making available a download of Boot Camp, which lets people dual boot on Macinteltosh machines. The download will be built into the next version of Mac OS X, 10.5, said Apple."

Intel's obsession with marchitecture is hiding real problems

Monday, April 03, 2006

Biotechnology | Here be dragons | Economist.com

Biotechnology | Here be dragons | Economist.com: "This involves synthesising, with actual DNA, the genetic material that the computer models predict will produce the mythical creatures. The synthetic DNA is then inserted into a cell that has had its natural nucleus removed. The result, Dr Fril and his commercial backers hope, will be a real live dragon, unicorn or what have you."